Wheat starts to arrive in Punjab mandis
Wheat has begun arriving in Punjab mandis, with early loads reported in Rajpura, Khanna, and Amritsar. Warm temperatures are speeding up crop maturity, prompting an expected surge in arrivals. Officials project 132 lakh tonnes, surpassing the FCI’s 124-lakh-tonne target. With ideal weather and widespread adoption of PAU’s PBW826 variety, yields may hit a record high since 2018.
The freshly harvested wheat has started arriving in the state mandis and procurement centres, which were opened on April 1 for rabi crop procurement. According to state food and civil supplies department officials, the early arrivals were reported in Rajpura, Khanna and Amritsar.
With the sudden rise in temperatures, which has crossed 36-37 degrees Celsius, wheat arrivals are expected to pick up pace, with experts saying that the rise in temperatures has triggered the fast maturing of the crop.
“We have received about 3-4 tonnes of crop, and there were arrivals reported in the mandis of Ludhiana district. It is expected to touch a few lakh tonnes by the end of the upcoming week,” said an official in the state food and supplies department, which has pegged the total arrivals to 132 lakh tonnes against the target of 124 lakh tonnes set by the Food Corporation of India, a Centre’s agency that takes delivery of grains from the state government and distributes it to the consumer states.
This season wheat was sown over nearly 35 lakh hectares and PAU’s variety PBW826 was sown over 30% of the total area under crop cultivation. The variety which was introduced last year has replaced the HD3086 and HD2967 varieties of the Indian council for agricultural research (ICAR).
According to the Punjab Agricultural University (PAU), Ludhiana, there are reports of ripening of the crop from across the state, and it is predicted that inflows into the mandis will pick up soon.
PAU head of agronomy department, Hari Ram, said that the state has witnessed the best crop season with mild winters and no harsh rainfall, wind or any other natural calamity and at the time of maturing, there was no sudden rise in temperatures like in some of the previous crop seasons.
“Total yield is expected to touch 186.82 lakh tonnes, highest since 2018 when average per hectare yield was recorded to 51.82 quintals,” he said.
It needs to be mentioned that the results of crop-cutting experiments by the state agriculture department are awaited, which would reveal the exact production.
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Source : Hindustan Times
